Software Radio Architecture: Object-Oriented Approaches to Wireless Systems Engineering - Hardcover

Mitola III, Joseph

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0471384925 ISBN 13: 9780471384922

Publisher: Wiley-Interscience, 2000

Synopsis

A software radio is a radio whose channel modulation waveforms are defined in software. All wireless telephones are controlled by this software. Written by the leader in the field, this book covers the technology that will allow cellular telephones to greatly expand the types of data they can transmit.

About this title

About the Author

JOSEPH MITOLA III, PhD, introduced the software radio architecture in 1992. He was the founding chair of the software-defined Radio (SDR) Forum in 1996. He teaches industrial courses on the subject in the United States and Europe for clients such as the U.S. Department of Defense. He is also widely published and cited, having served as editor-in-chief for the landmark May 1995 issue of IEEE (NY) Communications Magazine, the April 1999 Journal on Selection Areas in Communication on Software Radios, and the ongoing series Software and DSP in Radio.

From the Back Cover

An engineer's guide to systems engineering of software-radio architectures

As a crucial element of wireless technology, software radio is fast becoming a hot topic in the telecommunications field. This new book provides complete, up-to-date coverage of software radio architecture, discussing in detail functions, components, design procedures for complex radio systems, and large-scale software engineering methods such as UML and CORBA. The author bridges the inter-disciplinary gap in the field, covering what software engineers need to know about how radio "waveforms" are defined in software. Plus, he provides tutorial material on how the Unified Modeling Language-UML-is used for specifying radio architecture. The architecture tradeoffs-how to deliver predictably robust performance without unnecessarily expensive hardware, economic principles, cost considerations, and marketplace trends-are also addressed. Coverage includes:
* Market-oriented technology trends on how software radio fits in with the larger telecommunications marketplace
* Complexity drivers and their influence on hardware and software components
* System integration, emphasizing the management of processing capacity available on heterogeneous ASIC, FPGA, and DSP hardware
* Subsystem material and the unique requirements that software radio brings to the hardware and software segments-antennas, RF conversion, ADC/DAC, pooled DSP, real-time operating systems, CORBA middleware, and radio software objects
* Relevant areas of systems engineering, including design tools, cost-benefit analysis, and an extended case study, "Mobile Infrastructure for Joint Military-Civilian Disaster Relief"
* Hundreds of graphs, case studies, and Internet access to software design tools (email: jmitola@compuserve.com)

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Software Radio Architecture

Object-Oriented Approaches to Wireless Systems EngineeringBy Joseph Mitola III

John Wiley & Sons

Copyright © 2000 Joseph Mitola
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-471-38492-2

Contents

Preface......................................................................xvii1 Introduction and Overview..................................................1I. Revolution and Evolution..................................................1II. A Systematic Exposition..................................................2III. The Ideal Software Radio................................................2IV. The Software Radio Functional Architecture...............................5V. Basic Signal Processing Streams...........................................13VI. Implementation Alternatives..............................................17VII. The Acquisition of Software Radios......................................24VIII. Broader Implications of the Software Radio.............................29IX. Exercises................................................................332 Architecture Evolution.....................................................35I. Technology-Demographics...................................................35II. Commercial Architecture Needs............................................45III. Military Architecture Needs.............................................56IV. Open Architecture and Standards Evolution................................62V. Architecture Evolution Roadmap............................................69VI. Exercises................................................................713 The Radio Spectrum and RF Environment......................................73I. RF Signal Space...........................................................73II. HF Band Communications Modes.............................................77III. Low-Band Noise and Interference.........................................81IV. Low VHF (LVHF) Band Communications Modes.................................82V. Multipath Propagation.....................................................86VI. VHF Band Communications Modes............................................89VII. UHF Band Communications Modes...........................................92VIII. SHF Band Communications Modes..........................................95IX. Atmospheric Effects......................................................101X. EHF Band Communications Modes.............................................102XI. Satellite Communications Modes...........................................104XII. Multiband Multimode Summary.............................................109XIII. Exercises..............................................................1104 Systems-Level Architecture Analysis........................................112I. Disaster-Relief Case Study................................................112II. Radio Resource Analysis..................................................117III. Network Architecture Analysis...........................................140IV. Analyzing the Protocol Stacks............................................154V. Systems-Level Architecture Parameters.....................................1705 Node-Level Architecture Analysis...........................................171I. Architecture Representation...............................................172II. Industry-Standard Node Architectures.....................................207III. Programmable Digital Radio (PDR) Case Studies...........................215IV. Technology Pathfinders...................................................224V. Exercises.................................................................2356 Segment Design Tradeoffs...................................................236I. Overview..................................................................236II. Antenna Tradeoffs........................................................237III. RF and IF Processing Tradeoffs..........................................238IV. ADC Tradeoffs............................................................238V. Digital Architecture Tradeoffs............................................239VI. Software Architecture Tradeoffs..........................................240VII. Performance Management Tradeoffs........................................241VIII. End-to-End Tradeoffs...................................................242IX. Exercises................................................................2427 Antenna Segment Tradeoffs..................................................244I. RF Access.................................................................244II. Parameter Control........................................................246III. Packaging, Installation, and Operational Challenges.....................247IV. Antenna Diversity........................................................253V. Programmable Antennas.....................................................260VI. Cost Tradeoffs...........................................................261VII. Summary and Conclusions.................................................262VIII. Exercises..............................................................2638 RF/IF Conversion Segment Tradeoffs.........................................265I. RF Conversion Architectures...............................................265II. Receiver Architectures...................................................267III. RF Component Technology.................................................277IV. RF Subsystem Performance.................................................282V. RF/IF Conversion Issues...................................................285VI. Exercises................................................................2869 ADC and DAC Tradeoffs......................................................289I. Review of ADC Fundamentals................................................289II. ADC and DAC Tradeoffs....................................................294III. SDR Applications........................................................301IV. ADC Design Rules.........................................................305V. Exercises.................................................................31010 Digital Processing Tradeoffs..............................................312I. Metrics...................................................................312II. Heterogeneous Multiprocessing Hardware...................................316III. Applications-Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs).......................321IV. Field-Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs)...................................329V. DSP Architectures.........................................................336VI. INFOSEC Processor Architectures..........................................342VII. Host Processors.........................................................343VIII. Architecture Implications..............................................343IX. Exercises................................................................34511 Software Architecture Tradeoffs...........................................347I. The Software Design Process...............................................347II. Top-Down, Object-Oriented Design.........................................348III. Software Architecture Analysis..........................................359IV. Infrastructure Software..................................................363V. SDR State Machines........................................................374VI. Architecture Implications................................................377VII. Exercises...............................................................38212 Software Component Characteristics........................................384I. Hardware-Software Interfaces..............................................384II. Front-End Processing Software............................................392III. Modem Software..........................................................400IV. Bitstream Processing Software............................................422V. INFOSEC Software..........................................................423VI. Internetworking Software.................................................423VII. Source Segment Software.................................................428VIII. Other Software Issues..................................................432IX. Architecture Implications................................................434X. Exercises.................................................................43413 Performance Management....................................................437I. Overview of Performance Management........................................437II. Performance Management Process Flow......................................442III. Estimating Processing Demand............................................444IV. Benchmarking Applications................................................454V. Specifying Performance Parameters.........................................459VI. Architecture Implications................................................466VII. Exercises...............................................................46614 Smart Antennas............................................................467I. Smart Antenna Domains.....................................................467II. Multibeam Arrays.........................................................468III. Adaptive Spatial Nulling................................................470IV. Space-Time Adaptive Processing...........................................475V. Architecture Implications.................................................477VI. Exercises................................................................48015 Applications..............................................................482I. The Design Process........................................................482II. The Disaster-Relief System Design........................................483III. Architecture Implications...............................................491IV. Exercises................................................................49116 Reference Architecture....................................................493References...................................................................495Glossary.....................................................................515Index........................................................................533

Preface

The purpose of this text is to show how to integrate the analog RF and digital aspects of radio with the rapidly emerging large-scale object-oriented software technology needed for open-architecture software-defined radio (SDR).

This is therefore a systems engineering text. It is not a design text. This book will not help you design a better filter for a specific SDR. It will, however, help you make better decisions about how to partition the end-to-end system filtering requirements. It will help you allocate the critical functions of dynamic range and processing capacity in such a way that the filter's design constraints are well founded and that the hardware platform, firmware, and software support the filtering requirements of the software radio. This book will also give you quantitative criteria for deciding whether to host that filter in an analog package, digitally on an applications-specific integrated circuit (ASIC), or in software on the latest digital signal processing (DSP) chip. In addition, if the filter is to be implemented in software, this book will give you the skills to ensure that the software is well structured and performs robustly-even when many tasks are competing for processing resources. The appropriate host for such a filter changes over time. Commercial filter ASICs may become obsolete as DSP processing capacity increases, changing the systems-level tradeoffs. As needs, technology, and team expertise evolve, the effective choice will also change. The effective choice also changes as a function of the top-down design constraints placed on the radio system by the economics of the marketplace and by the larger systems architecture. And the effective choice may be to not implement the filter per se at all, but to procure it as part of an off-the-shelf subsystem. As we migrate to systems on a chip, this means the filter may entail intellectual property that has to be partitioned and protected, and yet has to be leveraged by the rest of the system. A sound systems-level architecture facilitates this process, while an inferior architecture inhibits it. The reduced time to market and cost efficiency of such buy-versus-make choices also require balancing the capabilities and design constraints given competing technical and economic constraints.

Software-radio is therefore an interdisciplinary technology, so this is an interdisciplinary text. The radio-oriented chapters are written for people with strong software background but little background in radio engineering. Software radio is about wideband radio frequency (RF) hardware that is given its "personality" by software. Therefore, the software people have to understand the RF hardware and air interface standards to the degree set forth in this text in order to function effectively on an interdisciplinary team. Similarly, the software-oriented chapters are written for people with strong background in RF, analog radio, or DSP but little background with large-scale software. And software radio is increasingly about complex, large-scale software. One of the revolutionary aspects of software radio is that knowing how to code a radio algorithm in C on a DSP just doesn't give a software engineer the core skills needed to contribute effectively to software radio architecture. In fact, that experience becomes a liability if it causes one to minimize the importance of the new large-scale software engineering methods like CORBA.

In addition, European readers will have to be patient with the tutorial material on SDL, the ITU-standard Specification and Description Language. In teaching the software radios course on which this book is based, I have found that US engineers make little use of formal methods for specifying radio functions. ETSI's emphasis on formal methods and the widespread use of SDL in support of European standards-setting process has not reached across the Atlantic yet. As a result, U.S. practitioners of radio engineering often try to do with pencil and paper what their European counterparts do on a computer-define new air interface standards. This text's treatment of UML extends the SDL material.

This text has several companions. The first is the Special Issue of the IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communication on Software Radios, published in April 1999 by the IEEE (New York). This JSAC is a surrogate graduate-level text. As such, it addresses related graduate-level research topics including mathematical structure of the software radio, virtual radios, advanced digital filter ASICs, smart antennas, and other advanced techniques. The IEEE Press Compendium Software Radio Technology by Mitola and Zvonar extends the JSAC with both earlier and more recent technical papers. Prof. Friedrich Jondral's course text in German (U. Karlsruhe) relates fundamental digital radio to SDR.

The dedication of this text to the "public interest" envisions the resulting affordable, robust, high-quality radio services as beneficial to the public interest. If coalition partners can cooperate better using software radios in peacekeeping roles, then that serves the public interest. If governments can acquire radio platforms at lower and more predictable cost, then that makes resources available for other public priorities. The focus of this text is the architecture. In this text, architecture is defined as the consistent set of functions, components, and design rules that promote open-architecture evolution of complex radio systems.

The book is organized for ease of access by a variety of readers. Chapters 1-3 provide the high-level background needed for a general understanding of how software radio fits in the larger telecommunications technology. Systems engineers and program mangers should have a solid grasp of chapters 4 and 5 in order to lead architecture evolution. Program managers and software engineers need to pay particular attention to the discussion of complexity drivers. Like any other software-intensive project, software radios are subject to subtle changes of the scope of the software. These chapters attempt to forewarn and thus forearm the team against factors that can drive software complexity and processing requirements out of the bounds of time, personnel, or processing capacity available on the project. The chapters on subsystems (6-12) focus on the requirements that software radio brings to the hardware and software segments. The software-oriented chapters are designed to be useful to hardware-oriented readers and the hardware-oriented chapters are designed to be useful to software-oriented readers. Sufficient basics on signal processing are included to provide a relatively self-contained treatment. The concluding chapters (13-16) provide examples of how to apply software radio architecture to create robust yet affordable multiband multi-mode communications systems.

I really enjoy interacting with those of you who are out there creating SDR systems and propelling the software radio evolution forward. Since you have purchased this text, you probably would like to use the knowledge you gain. A few spreadsheet design tools can help with some important aspects of that task. These are the software radio spreadsheets. You get access to them via the author's software radios web site. The URL is http://ourworld.compuserve.com/ homepages/jmitola. The site is for folks who purchased this text. By following the instructions on the site, you can get access to the design aids. I also welcome questions from readers about this text, or anything in the area of software radio technology.

Best regards,

Joe Mitola

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Software Radio Architectureby Joseph Mitola III Copyright © 2000 by Joseph Mitola. Excerpted by permission.
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Edition details

• Publisher: Wiley-Interscience
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0471384925
• ISBN 13: 9780471384922
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 543